Letters to Mike - The News.

What news do you check out?
Here are some good sites:

http://www.democracynow.org/ - I download their daily new hour.
http://www.truthdig.com/
http://www.alternet.org/
http://www.factcheck.org/
http://www.centerforinquiry.net/
http://mediamatters.org/and closer to home:

http://www.policyalternatives.ca/
http://thetyee.ca/

Rules and advice about information and news:

1) Just remember don’t just trust anyone (yes, even me).

2) Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

3) The more sources of news you can get (even occasionally from the evil ones like CNN) the clear the truth will filter its way out.

4) If you listen to enough, you start to cross-reference stories; hear them from different biases and our of that you discover the truth is usually not what you have been told but somewhere in-between.

5) If someone suggest something big (9/11 was a Nazi Conspiracy), in your mind, assume its true and work out the implications. If those implications also are true then maybe its true but often most big things fail this test. For example – IF 9/11 was a Nazi Conspiracy, then the Nazi’s would be in power, we would be racially segregated and the Jews would be dead; none of this happed, so its most likely there was no Nazi Conspiracy involved in 9/11.

6) Use your head.

Letters to Mike - Bush is bad

-- one thing is clear however bush has done more damage than any terrorist organization could ever have hoped for

Well, yes and YES! It is hard to believe that one administration (I don’t like giving Bush any credit, even the bad stuff) could be so ruinous to their own country, global peace and the concept of internationalism. The really interesting thing will be to see what happened in 2008. There should be 0% chance of the Republicans winning…well in a fair election. And even if the Dems win, who wins will be important(ish). Nader, Moore, Chomsky and others, make the point that because of the dollar-ocracy in the US, the Dems and Reps are really the same kind of party, just different colours. That why things were not really better (well again, it’s hard to comprehend how bad Bush is) under Clinton.

Letters to Mike - the apparent rise of the Canadian $

-Canada’s dollar could be worth even more but Canada might deliberately keep it lower for trade

No and yes. The dollar, although doing well compared to the Yank dollar, is not doing as badly and the US $ when compared to the British pound, Euro, Yen (less so on this one) and the Yuan. We are so infected with American Business (your province being the worst offender) and dependent of their trade, that if they go down, we go down. Until someone in Canada shift us to the left or to Europe or to China and away for the US, only then do we have a chance.

Letters to Mike - currencyin TNWO

-- once new world order is established I think the euro dollar will be the currency of choice

Why the Euro? The Yuan Renminbi (Chinese currency) maybe. I think the US has mucked things up in Europe that the Union will be weak and ineffective for at least another generation or three. Remember the US push for Kosovo independence, Missile Defence in Easter Europe, and the resurgence of Imperial Russia under Putin.

Letters to Mike - Word getting out

-- the govs are worried that if word gets out that they will surely be foiled.

Well, I think, if there is a BIG conspiracy, they have enough control over the media (print, TV, movies, and the internet) that they would worry about anything. IF a web site was too dangerous; it would have sudden virus attack, or their server would go down or worse. IF they did 9/11, “Loose Change” would not be a problem.

Letters to Mike - Rendition and Detention

-- Soon one won't be able to speak out against the government. I have found some great info online.

Well, I can’t argue with you about that. You remember in the US, they had those illegal phone taps…to ferret out “terrorists”, I find it inconceivable that Bush (or at least Rove) did not listen into the Democrats calls. Bush should have lost in 2004; it was as if they had inside information.
To add to your nightmares, Harper is a Bush wannabe. I have no doubts that his gang are using similar dirty tricks. Fortunately, for some weird reason, our system still seems slightly less susceptible to US style campaigning…for now (I think).

Letters to Mike - U.S. Law (and ours too)

--- U.S. Law states that they can confiscate anyone's dwelling even if they are a law biding citizen.

Those laws have always existed. Imminent domain, they can do it here too. The one that scares the hell out me is the rendition program. To kidnap people from anywhere and send to torture camps. What is even worse is the ability of the government (similar laws exist in Canada and UK) to “detain” people on suspicion of wrong doing (evidence of which is “top secrete” so you have to trust those who locked you up that evidence even exists and is creditable. When you start torturing people, anything they say is useless and lies). That they can keep you locked up indefinitely; with out trial, appeal, or hope.

Letters to Mike - USA - The New Rome?

Well, I have heard some people say that what we may be listening is not the end of the US, but the end of the Republic and the birth of the Empire – just like Rome. Things in Rome, at the end of the republic, where so bad, things in such turmoil, that the people and politicians were willing to hand over everything to anyone who promised to bring prosperity and security. Sound familiar?

Letters to Mike - the Killing conspiracy

-- Anyone gets in their way "Wack'em" i.e.: Lincoln, both Kennedys, Marilyn Monroe etc.

Well, I don’t know about the “wack’em”. Sure you might say that Lincoln, and Kennedy MAY have been trouble (to who?) and were killed. But I think Marilyn is a stretch (she had real life problems) and why not include Elvis, John Lennon or Jim Morrison? And if they would kill Kennedy why not Eisenhower? Or Ralph Nader? There are too many people they should have killed that they didn’t to make me think of the big “C”. One or two, maybe…sure but not a multi-century one, the evidence nor conclusions hold out (i.e., if they were wack’em people, we should be living in a Big Brother state by now)

Letters to Mike - U.S. theory

Well first I would point out that “THEM” or “the puppet masters” (include Bush et all is you wish) are divided into three main groups.

1) The Neo-liberals – These are the capitalist. The ones who want to “shrink the size of government down so you could drown in the bath-tub”.
With what you said about saying the opposite of what you do; the “No child left behind” legislation intended to help child poverty of course reduced money given to help children because Bush did not give it any money in his budgets.

They push for the big tax cuts, global trade agreements that basically turn everyone (including the Americans and us) into slave labour. They are also responsible for the resistance against the move to reduce climate change. They try and destroy environmental and labour protections.

They are the ones Prez. Eisenhower warned people about when he left office. (Documentary – “Why we fight” 2006). They support the Neo-cons because they see money in the New America project. The also find it easier to manipulate a totalitarian state than a democratic one. They support the Theo-cons because they both like the idea of a repressive social order completely obedient to the power – which they see as the corporation if church/state garb.

http://www.thecorporation.com/
http://www.adbusters.org/home/

2) The Neo-cons – these are the ones who want the police state. Who believe the US is destine to rule the world in Pax America.

They push for the military action in Iraq. Want to push it for Iran. They got Bush et all, to tear up arms reduction treaties, turn the UN (not that it needed a lot of help) into nothing more than a debating society.

It is funny that the patriot act was already written BEFORE 9/11. They had it ready. The creation of what people are now calling the Imperial Presidency, when the US Prez, does what he want with none of the checks & balances (i.e. the other branches of government – Congress and Judiciary) they yanks are always said made their system so superior.

They support the Neo-Liberal because they want the support for their expansionist plans and they thing capitalism is a slave to the US (in this they are very wrong, capitalism have not friends). They support the Theo-cons because they can provide the “ground troops” as in the electorate. They provide half of the police that maintains the totalitarian state.

http://www.americanempireproject.com/
http://www.newamericancentury.org/
http://www.globalresearch.ca/

3) The Theo-Cons – these are the people who want Armageddon. The ones who read and believe the Left Behind series of books. Bush is one of these, he believe he is agent of god, that he can no now wrong because he is divinely lead. Him and Blaire.

They attempt to illuminate free thought. They envy countries like Afghanistan and Iran because of their theocracies. They wish to remove the separation of church and state. They push policies that repress societies and make the docile and controllable by the church elite.

They support the other two because they believe no matter what they may give up in the short run, what gold they may give to Caesar, in the end (and they believe this to be sooner – like the next 20-50yrs) the apocalypse will straighten everything out. Their prime goal is to set the stage for Armageddon – start it if they need to. This explains why they, more than the other groups, support Israel as much as they do. According to their beliefs, once the Jews control the land of Abraham, the end of times will come.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theocon
http://www.samharris.org
http://www.slate.com/?id=2165033
http://richarddawkins.net/

Letters to Mike...9/11

Well, in the short, I don’t think it was planned by Bush or his crew. I do think they milked it for all its worth. I think they “let” it happen – when you an ideologue you get tunnel vision; Bush was more worried that rich and the righteous to worry about “foreigners”.
I do think it’s possible that elements in the US (CIA, Commandos or just some nuts) may have facilitated the attack. There is a lot of “evidence” that it was not just a 4 planes crashing. I have seen a lot of the docs on it. I think the biggest reasons I don’t think it was a US conspiracy (obviously it was an Islamism one…they apparently drove the planes) because of 2 things.
One, I don’t have confidence they could pull it off. I mean they are just incompetent. And building on that, those involved would have spilled the beans. That kind of a secrete, regardless of its intent (more so in how it’s been a disaster for the US) would not have stayed secrete – where is the guy who says, “I actually flew the plane or planted the explosives”?
Secondly, if it is true, that means there is a cabal in control of the US, the most powerful and belligerent entity on earth, who would think of nothing in killing thousands of their own to forward their aims (not to mention, that if they could kill thousand, why not kill the “loose change” guy and his fell debunkers?). If such a group were in control, you would expect thing to be more…ordered in the US. The US winning wars. If this cabal was so great in pulling off 9/11 they seem to have screwed the pooch on everything else.
I am more inclined to think that maybe passive help (i.e., not looking for bombs or suspects) may have happened. Not to instigate 9/11 but to instigate something – I suspect Bush, at least, had no idea the twin towers would the target. But once it did happen, the Project for the New American Century group (http://www.newamericancentury.org/) and those of a like mind, jumped at the opportunity. From there the Iraq was came from and the Patriot act. Ironically a second group also took advantage, they libertarian conservatives of Chaney, who jumped on the opportunity to, as you put it, bankrupt the US and destroy the government and replace it with the “watch man” government (only responsible for law and defence – for every and anything else, people are on their own.. like health, school, roads….etc.)
I heard a funny thing the other day. Someone said Bush was really an anarchist who is undercover. He has infiltrated the US to as to destroy the state. I agree that the Bush (and the puppeteers behind him) is intending to get rid of all social programs by bankrupting the US. They, neo-liberals, know they could not get popular support to get rid of social programs, like Old Age Security (although they did try) so if you cant get it voted out, just remove the money that would pay for it…legislation by attrition.
But look at me ramble on…you get me started. Well I will end it here. Peace, joy and happiness

The vision of time...

What is “Visual” time?
Up to know we have dealt with time as either immaterial or at least trans-dimensional. There is however the school of thought championed by Aristotle that saw time not as a thing but an effect. To say some one has passed through time, we say they have aged. To age is to grow/decay. To Aristotle time was merely and solely the physical changes experience. If one could somehow be placed one twin into a “stasis field”, like mentioned in science fiction, a field were all physical operations were suspended, for a period of 150 years. The stasis twin would leave this field completely unchanged from the time entered whereas the other would be long since decayed. One could say, from this experiment that the stasis twin was timeless while in field.

The problem with visual time

As stated with our twin experiment, it appears that on twin is timeless. If we could replicate the effect but with a pill or some other thing such that the twin could interact with the world, would it still follow that they were timeless? If nothing existed in the universe but a lump of coal, does it follow that until the coal changes or some spontaneous creation occurs that the universe described is outside of or beyond time? It would seem apparent that if one substituted the coal with oneself that we would still “feel” time inspire of the absence of change.
Subjective to the non-stasis fielded twin

The Measure of Time...

What is “Measured” time?

Another way of looking at time is to see it as a relative relations between two arbitrary point. For example Monday to Sunday, we say the period of time they represent is a week. Further, we state that there is a progression of days such that we know Monday always proceeds Tuesday and is in turn followed by Wednesday. We can tell where in time these events occur independent of our personal sense of time. This concept can be extended to clocks, colanders or geological epochs. These measures can also be less technical; they can apply to the idea birth, growth, decay and death.

Science of time

The need to measure time can be seen as the quantification of time or time as science – Chronology. In order to study time; it is necessary to create some form of independent scale that non-self’s can understand. As stated in “felt” time is very self-centered; so giving each “time event” a label allows scientific study. For example we can say with pure accuracy that Augustus Caesar died on August 19, 14 AD and that five hundred years later, September 4 476 AD, his empire was gone from Western Europe. Very precise and it does not fall into the ambiguity one date meaning two things as we found with “past” in “felt” time. This being said, we do find that it has a skeleton in it closet.

Problems with “Measured” time

Dependency of the “Measured” time

Have said that we can create a system of labelling such that relationships between events can be reasoned independent of personal experience, we are left with the question; knowing that the Cambrian period is before the Holocene is meaningless or at least limited in meaning if we can not relate it to now. In order for the series or measure to have meaning we mush be able to apply the “felt” time standard. We must know if an event is a past event or present or future. If we lack that information, the scale that we use has no base of reference, no real meaning at all. If I were to state that the first moon colony was built on April 1, 2150 and that the 9/11 happened on September 11, 2001; could you by virtue of the dates know which was real or which speculation? No, unless you have a now, we are unable to interpret what was and what could be.
This realization that in order to understand what dates mean we must have an understanding of the now but in measured time there is no now; could not be. Each event is labelled with a relative term yet “now” passes over them all. The now can not be part of the scale. So for the scale to have any meaning we must affix it to something beyond.

Duck Time

Time is our river, and we can gauge it flow by having a friend place an infinite number of sequentially number ducks at regular intervals. We then sit back, at some point down river we observe the ducks pass by like sands through the hourglass. Our Duck Time, though, is seen to pass only because we are external to the river. If we were in the river, one of our ducks, we would see no time pass at all as the only duck would be ourselves. But if we are on the bank watching the ducks pass by, then we our outside the river of time; we are a form of hyper-time.
Lets continue this Duck Time experiment, let us say that the observer on the back change every dawn and dusk. So our observers are themselves measurable but only if we again introduce another fixed reference, the sun; resulting in hyper-hyper time. This fixed sequence can become quickly an infinite regression with no necessary termination - reductio ad absurdum.
Thus, “measured” time seems unable to account for time and ultimately rests on the presupposition of “felt” time. There, however another more physical sense of time; that found in causation.

The Feel of Time

What is “Felt” time
What do we think when we say we are “in” time? Often, when pressed, we say that time is felt as things that are past, present or future. If someone asks you about an event, your first instinct is to determine if it is in the past, present or future. Our language is predicated on “tense” wordage. That our sense of the past is what we remember. Our sense of the present is what we are experiencing and the future is what we will feel. This is a very primal way of seeing time; it requires no culture, no language or even a universe. It is the fundamental way we organize our life.
The future is man
We grant that most thinking things and even some not so thinking, have memory. Simple Pavlovian reaction or instinct shows most life has a “past”, and similarly to be classified alive it must in come way participate in a now, but it is, for the most part, man that we grant the special providence of for-sight. The ability to, not only plan, but to conserve of a present that is not “of the is-now” but “of the to-come”. Academic philosophers refer to this type of “time” as “A” series. It is the idea that time is seem only in terms of what it past, what is present and what if future. It is time as we feel it. This works for our internal conversations, but to transmit ideas of time to others we often use “measured” time.

Problems with “Felt” time

Incoherency of time
The problem with “Felt” time is two fold. First, the renowned philosopher J.M.E. McTaggart believed there an intrinsic contradiction in the idea of past present and future as terms to delineate time. The basic premise of his argument lies in the fact that all the terms can be applied to any event, thus rendering them meaningless or at least inconsistent. Any event, for example, in the present may also be said to be a past event in the future. Thus the label for this even would be a future past present event; thus the terms seem non-specific.
Relativistic nature of time
Another problem with “felt” time is the relativistic nature of it. Although many events may have a similar perspective with regards to past, present or future; this is a coincidence and not a necessity. The fact that my elderly neighbour eats dinner at 4pm. I eat at 6pm and the high school kids eat at 8pm. When I am eating, the neighbour’s dinner is in the past and the kids in the future, yet by their perspective, when neighbour eats, my dinner is in the future and yet the kid’s dinner is in a different future. Finally when the kids eat, as similar relativist effect occurs when my dinner is now past, and the neighbour’s dinner is also past but a different past than mine.
Mental convenience or irrelevant
We are left with two conclusions, first the idea of what is past or present or future depends on the observer. This idea of time is truly personal and as such looses meaning beyond the self. If we are to find a time beyond out own psychology then this concept seems to fail. Secondly, even if we somehow concede that this time may more than mental convenience, if is a term at best of negation not definition. To say something is past does nothing more than rule out it being in the others. We have shown that two events are “past” but not he same “past”, leading us to say that either the term is incoherent or irrelevant.
Either way, it seems “Felt” time is at best a mental convenience, not a thing of the universe but a construct of our minds. Perhaps is we apply a scale to time, measure it in such a way that it become common or independent of the observer. In this way perhaps we can find time.

Lost land of the free....

I have never been a big fan of the USA. Its history of hypocrisy and self-centeredness has made it bully of the community of national. But this recent event of the Aqua-teen Hunger Force advertising campaign and the response to it by the city of New York, the national media and the population in general has shown a major c-change in the USA. Perhaps to be fair, others have been talking about since 9/11. The world bully has turned into the scared little girl.

I think its a landmark not because it is another incidence of the the paranoia of the Americans, seeing bogeyman around every corner. Most of the other events (well all i know of) have been plausible, exaggerated but plausible. Having seen the LED signs that were posted around Boston (and other cities (apparently) with no panic) i have to say it would take a tremendous act of will to imagine them as any form of "bomb". Even so, after investigating one of them i becomes irrational to continue with this mindset, and continue it did.

One of the most defining elements of the USA is its idea of freedom of expression. It has survived attacks from all sides and for a plethora of reasons. But i see that this advertising campaign has, implicitly if not legally (its too early to say it will be legally restricted), limited this freedom to things that do not create a fear, however abstract, in the government and the paranoid fringe (I wonder who started this fear-hunt?). Its is ironic that the perpetrator of the greatest injury on the USA is the USA. The terrorists that hit the twin towers, i am curtain, believed there attack would "bring the USA to its senses" (that it could not inflict pain with impunity). What it did was drive the USA deeper into its psychos, causing tit to lash-out not only outwardly to inwardly.

I hope USA, as a government, as a nation and as people, collectively seek counselling. What started out as a mild personality disorder is rapidly turning into psychotic behavior. The worst thing the world needs is a insane super power, we have seen it before, and Nazi Germany nearly drove the world into the abyss. Let us hope the USA find treatment or self destructs (as the Nazis did).

Mataphysics...

There are three parts to "our" world. There is teh material universe, the genetic self and the abstract universe.

The material universe exists independent of ourselfs, it is the trees in the cambrian forest; i have no way of knowing they exist but i acknowledge that there is a world exest extrernal to self.

The genetic self is the only material reality that we may know directly, that exists both independent of self and as an extetion of self in the material universe. The mind knows all of the external world via the genetic self, it has no capacity to experience the material directly but only thoguht the mediatio of the genetic self (the flesh)

The Abstract universe is that which thought existes, and only thought. It is the solipsistic universe, the simulation in the machine. Like a simulation, if may seem real to the object running the program. Does the computer know the WarCraft is a game or is it reality to it. Optical regonition software approximate the idea of perserving sendoriy data from the opital organ (the hardware of the computer is the gentetic self) of a room (the materail universe) and seeing a room, a table, a world (the abstract univerve)

It is this the abstract mind that creates qualia. Even if we assume (and we can only do this, although with much confidence) there is a persitant substancance material world external to us and our experance, We all sence it thought our own unigue biologal organs, which will never give a complete duplicative redision. BUT even if we assume that what we experence is a duplicative one, our manifistation of that data in our abstract universe, the only on we KNOW, the experance of that data will be the unigue interpritation of our solipisitic world, created not by will but but the continual accumulation, interpitatotion, manipulation, deterioration and temporal existance. There is no absolute experance of Dog, everyone has a unique and particular abstract consept of dog, the product of there unique path though time and space.

So why is it possible people can communicate? if the abstract exist only in the mind, they how can anyone learn or transmit them?

The pains of private healthcare…pt1

I welcome the opportunity, if I may take it from Louise, to provide first the main reasons “trying” private health care, at least on the models currently proposed have/will not work. Then I will provide an alternative (not that I assume my ideas are the best, but they have yet to be tried…)

First there are three main aspects of private delivery health care. The US model, which most of us are aquatinted with, is composed of these fundamental parts: private health care providers (the doctors et all) using private healthcare facilities (Hospitals and the like) paid by private healthcare users (you and me sooner or later). This model has been tired (i.e. the US) and the Americans are desperately trying to change their system and adopt ours. If you are wealthy in the US, their system works but beyond the top 10% the system begins to fail. The idea that one illness, pregnancy, or injury has the potential of stripping you of your house and saving is one that faces most Americans every day…and you would want that to be tried here? There is also the secondary issue; let say you have insurance and you are feeling ill. Do you go to the doctor or wait hoping it will go away on its own? If you go to the doctor a claim is made on your insurance; such claim will cause an increase (often extreme increase of 100-400%) of your premiums eventually driving insurance beyond your grasp. So, you want to ration your visits, only go when it is absolutely necessary…but your not a doctor, how do you know when you need to go so often when your body forces a visit the condition is far worse, costing more money (something for profit healthcare likes). The fundamental problem with this system is the primary goal of all concerned is not health but money.

I will continue this in a future post where I will discuss the individual problems of Private Providers (Self-employed doctors et all, pharmaceutical companies), private facilities (for profit hospitals and the like), private management (non-profit hospitals run by for profit companies) and private funding (User fees, private insurance, government funding, and the variations)

I will them provide (as requested) a solution to the “problem” of our current healthcare system.

A stink about Maple Leaf Foods???

When I read the article on the CBC website Maple Leaf ends Chinese worker program over job fees I must confess to having mixed feeling. It brings up several important issues. One, the element from which the others spawn, in why, with an unemployment rate of ~4.5% do we need to “import” labour? They employees in question are apparently paid at least $15/hr. With a minimum wage of only $7.60, it would seem to be a finically lucrative. From what I know from my contacts in Brandon, the work is steady and full time. There is not the problem you get at places such as Wal-Mart (and the like) where no one gets enough hours to constitute a “full-time” job. I am also under the impression that job security is good. It well paid, steady work so we must ask ourselves why do “Canadians” not want to work at Maple Leaf Foods’ pork processing plant in Brandon, Manitoba?

Well there is more to work than the money. I have lived in Brandon a great many years and can attest that although it is by all accounts a small city (large town) is has no slums…no rampant crime…it is a very typical place to live. So location is not a detriment. Even if we assumed that the people of Brandon were very xenophobic, it would not explain why they would not accept their “own” people (i.e. they are more likely to accept other Canadians or Manitobans than imported labour). So, it’s not the money, it’s not the locations, it’s not the people…what about the working conditions? Well, I have done some cursory research into the matter, and although there are many environmental problems regard to the farming of hogs and many concerns over the monopolistic tendencies of the company, I find no issues with working at the plant. Some one could correct me on this, I believe the repetitive nature of the work, the handling of dangerous tools and extended working periods would make for a bad job site, none seem to have raised the issue in a vocal manner.

So we are left with the mystery as to why Maple Leaf Foods needs to import workers, I can not say. But I did notice on thing in the research, I found that a study done as part of the social impart of the plant, done between September 1999 and November 1999 (based on employment numbers compared to those reported in the analysis). In this survey it makes the claim that 73% of the employees were local to Brandon and region and that only 1 employee claims to have moved to Brandon to work in the plant.

Later it mentions these “Quick Maple Leaf Foods Brandon facility facts”
• 1300+ employees
• Approximately 44% of the current Maple Leaf Foods Brandon employees are foreign workers (95% historical retention rate for foreign workers).
• Approximately 25% of the current Maple Leaf Foods Brandon employees are aboriginal workers.
• Based on known demographics for current foreign workers, we anticipate the arrival of approximately 1400 foreign family members in the next 24 months as applications for landed immigrant status are approved.

From this we get that approximately 572 employees are foreign (the studies that lead to the approval of the plant seems a bit off on this) of which they expect that (historically) that can hope to retain 540 or so. Meaning they will need 30 or even let say 100 replacements. But if they expect 1400 new immigrant works in the next 24 months they either plan to double the size of the plant (which they can not having reached a hog production limit that has forced them to reduce the hours of plant operation) or that the next 1400 employees will have a retention rate of 7% (a little less than the “historic” rate).
I guess my point is that things do not add up. There is a bad small to the operation and I suspect the workers are the ones who suffer. What if the word?

An election in the wind…

Well, it started with the election of Dion, then the timely departure from provincial politics of former Premier Bernard Lord, and now the inevitable pre-election cabinet shuffle. I think that historically small “C” conservatives are more likely to vote and therefore cold weather favours the Conservative Party. Add to these signs, we have the apparent manoeuvring of Harper of stroking the Quebec vote. The last election showed that the Conservatives, at present, have reached their high-water mark in Ontario, so the area Harper is looking at for grow will not be at the expense of the Liberals but the Bloc. The Bloc has also reached a turning point. After the extension of life given it by the Sponsorship scandal, the Bloc see its end, and so does Harper. Harper, though, has to walk a fine line between sucking up to the Quebecquer yet not alienate their western (anti-east) base. A tight rope he does not want to walk long.

Sooooo, with all this being said, it seem to be that I would be surprised if there was not an election call prior to the end of February. The only thing preventing an election in the next couple of months is a concerted effort by the opposition to keep Harper in power. Politics makes for stranger comedy than any stand-up routine. An election late in February (more likely early March) will bring a Liberal Minority Government with the NDP provided majority. It will mark the end of Layton and the current NDP who will be need to do for the left, what the Reform Party did for the right. The Bloc will be decimated with Liberals picking up most of the seats. Harper will keep power and run in the next election although he will have to wait several years (at least 3) before the opportunity to take the reigns of power will come again.

My predictions are out there, let see what history brings.

The slipper slope to genocide…

Well, according to the latest pundency, my assessment of Saddam’s execution was correct. None believe it was planned by the government, not even Fox News. There are some who thing that if the Bush administration says something, it must be the inverse of the truth, so when the Administration said it had no warning about the the plans and nothing to do with them, you can almost be certain that the opposite is true. By this logic, Bush new about it and had something to do in its timing.
Another line, and one I think is more likely now, is that it was a power play by Muqtada al-Sadr. Having hear that the Prime Minister Maliki wanted to resign his post, and the way the sectarians of the timing of the execution, it makes it far more likely that Iraq is continuing to polarize which may inevitably arrive at its logical genocidal conclusion. History has an interesting pattern that no matter how bad things are, if left to fester things will always get worse. There is no 12step program for national insanity and I fear I must say that ;for the first time since the start of this farce call “the state of Iraq” (it was called a republic until the Americans annexed it and turned it into a state, literally);.I believe that Iraq will descend into genocidal violence akin to what plagues British India and its partition at independence. Well, it’s good to be Canada…and more to the point NOT to be in Iraq (my hopes and condolences to those not so lucky)